, 1887-10-06
MAN AND HIS JACK K,sIEE.
A Peculiar Collection of BLADES in tho
National Museum.

A Peculiar Collection of BLADES in tho
National Museum.
Professor Otis Mason, of the National
museum, made an appeal to the public at
large the other day for an Eighteenth
century jack knife. That evening, be-
fore the professor finished his dinner, Q
gentleman brought to his house a rusty
and broken old knife dug up on the
battlefield of Ticonderoga-found side by
side with the flint blade of an Indian
knife. Yesterday some one. signing the
name Of Benjamin Franklin, sent the
professor the knife with which, it is
claimed, Franklin fashioned the sticks
for his kite. 1t is not a jack knife, but
a penknife of very modern manufacture,
having, as some modern pocket knives
have, a little pair of SCISSORS in it, in place
of one of the blades. Another gentleman,
whose official position has given him op-
p%ortunity to make such collections, has
promised to give the museum, not a jack
knife of the Eighteenth century, but a
collection of Asiatic knives. The Ticon-
deroga knife is rusted and the blade is
broken. 1t WAS a long, slender knife of
n blade, and originally the blade turned
on a hinge or spring so that the knife
could be shut, but it is rusted stiff nov
Every boy knows what jack knife is,
and there are very few American boys
who have not owned one. What a great
museum wants Of q jack knife, though,
may puzzle not only the boys, but some
of the old folks, too. Therein lies hidden
the prime idea of the National museum,
which is SO planned and arranged that
when the grand scheme is fully per-
fected it will tell the story Of a man in
all his relations. 1t will tell, in object
lessons, how he was Graded, what he
played with when a child, how he
was dressed, what his occupations
in manhood, how he went to the
war, how and what he worshiped,
what ceremonies attended his mar
riage and funeral. 1t will tell the
story not only of n man, as he is known
and seen today on Pennsylvania avenue,
but of primitive man, of the red man, the
African, the Esquimau. His social rela-
tons and his ~employments will be illus
trated. All things laid under contribu-
ton for his use or amusement will have
full exposition. And the jack knife tells
something of this great story. The jack
knife, Professor Mason says, is properly a
knife of one blade. 1t derives its name
from the French Jacques, which is a name
given to low, illiterate fellows. Their
knives had but one blade. When a man
learned to write he had TO sharpen his
pen, and carried q p~enknife with two n
more blades. To tell the history of the
jack knife or one Eladed knife would re-
quire q large case in the National museum.
Professor Mason has the materials scat
tered about the shelves and drawers in
his laboratory at the National museum.
He has the rude stone blades of the
paleolithic and neolithic man, the rude
savage that lived with the beasts before,
perhaps, Atlantis sank beneath the wave,
in ages SO far back that even Hindoo
chronology can hardly supply a measure
for the time. Then he has a long and
slender blade of bronze from Etruria,
from the men who lived and wrought
with exquisite skill in Italy before Romu-
lus' and Remus' time, and who nave left
beautiful memorials of their existence,
and inscriptions which no man has ever
been able to decipher. But the most
complete part of the collection is that
illustrating the Indian jack knife, which
the Indian used for every purpose. Blades
of stone, flint or slate were bound upon a
hasp of wood or bone. The edges were
Clipped or ground till they were sharp and
pointed. Then when the Indian or Esqui.
mau came into contact with the white
trader their knives began to have iron or
steel blades. One E%squimau knife is made
out Of an old can opener.-Washington